Quote:
Originally posted by John Arduini
I was doing a men's rec league game yesterday under NCAA men's rules and a player got a breakaway, ran down the court, threw the ball off the backboard, took a few steps, caught the ball and then dunked it. I called him for traveling as you can't pass to yourself. He said he was shooting and therefore not a violation. Your thoughts??
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Shot or pass is a judgement call on your part. Basically, it's a shot if you think the player was shooting.
If you judge that he was shooting, then he can get the ball back, dribble, shoot, anything. The ball doesn't even have to touch the backboard---it can miss everything and he can still get the rebound legally.
If you judge that he wasn't shooting, then there are a couple of possibilities. If the player hadn't dribbled before throwing the ball up, then this might just be the beginning of a dribble. The backboard is considered part of the floor in this case. Your description makes me thing that he was dribbling before he threw the ball.
OK, now you have to think about how he released the ball. Did he end his dribble before throwing the ball? If not, throwing the ball against the backboard is just a continuation of the dribble, as I mentioned above.
OK, now suppose he dribbled, took the ball in both hands (ending the dribble), threw it off the backboard, caught it, and dunked it. If he catches it with his feet on the floor, then I think we have a double dribble (*not* a travel), since throwing it against the backboard constitutes the beginning of a new dribble. If he catches it in the air, though, and dunks all in one motion...I don't think there's a case in the rulebook that deals with this, and I can see it going either way. (This is the Tracy McGrady play from the all-star game!) My instinct is that it's legal, but I'll have to thumb through the book some more to back this up.